


Seventeen Canvases: Luc Chantal Done By Marina Melnyk

by dangercupcake



Category: Superstition by Superstition_hockey
Genre: Art History, Canon Queer Relationship, F/F, Food, Long-Term Relationship(s), Queer History, superstition by superstition_hockey - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-12
Updated: 2019-01-12
Packaged: 2019-10-08 23:03:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17395391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dangercupcake/pseuds/dangercupcake
Summary: Diana loves to talk about her Master’s thesis -- and now official dissertation -- subject, so Minerva will let her talk.





	Seventeen Canvases: Luc Chantal Done By Marina Melnyk

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Breakaway](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8917384) by [Superstition_hockey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Superstition_hockey/pseuds/Superstition_hockey). 



Minerva is not a dumbass, so when she gets the text “I did it!” she goes into the kitchen to see what’s there. She digs around and comes up with everything for enchiladas from scratch. The tortillas are a little old, but once she gets them going in oil, they come to life, filling the kitchen with their good corn smell. They have jarred enchilada sauce for long days, but she skips that, defrosting chicken broth to make hers from scratch just the way she’d been taught as a child, letting the chili pepper powder fill her nose as it mixes with her roux.

She is so fucking proud of Diana. 

The enchiladas are done before Diana gets home, and it’s not dinner time yet anyway, so Minerva does up a simple chocolate cake that she knows Diana likes, and lets that bake; the oven needs to be hot anyway for the enchiladas. It’s so indulgent, she knows, but it’s a celebration! They’ll have ice cream, too, and it’s a lot of dairy for them, but it’s just them in the bed, and farts make Diana giggle.

Minerva sits back down at her computer to check her messages, see if there’s anything she missed . . . nothing. It’s been a slow Thursday, no one needing her for anything, no one scheduling meetings, or looking to have something pulled from the image archives, or anything, really. Before Diana’s text, Minerva had been playing Solitaire with real cards and streaming the local classic rock station. When had songs from her own childhood become classic rock? It wasn’t that long ago! Minerva goes back to Solitaire. She could try knitting something, but Diana is the knitter. The crafter. Minerva is the cook and the cleaner. She could run a load of laundry, but sometimes having the oven on and running the washer at the same time makes their electricity go out. Solitaire it is.

Diana’s hair is a mess when she comes inside, falling out of her braid that Minerva had plaited for her that morning because Diana’s bad shoulder had locked up. It’s these little things that Minerva takes and cherishes about their relationship -- these little things that Minerva never thought she’d have with another person because she could never get past her own insecurities to say to someone “I like you _like that_ ”. But Diana . . . didn’t let anything stop her. 

Not even a bunch of hostile old assholes at her university.

“You did it!” Minerva said before Diana could. 

“I did it!” Diana cried. “And Rosalita said it was ridiculous, that we were entirely the wrong university to do this at, that she had no idea why I was picking this, that no one would ever be interested in this, that it was too focused on men, and that I was going to shoot myself in the foot by focusing on such a silly part of Melnyk’s work, and then said she supposed she’d have to agree to be my advisor because no one else would ever do it in the whole world.”

“Which is exactly what you wanted and expected.”

“Which is _exactly_ what I wanted and expected,” says Diana triumphantly. “Then I gave her the first three chapters and said, you know, by the way, _you_ are related to Marina Melnyk, and Luc Chantal is one of your relatives, and I think in your own family archives is what I’ve been looking for, so if you could let me take a look, I’d be grateful, and she got that look on her face like a stupid puppy, and I felt like I had _won everything_.”

“I still don’t get how Rosalita is related to them,” says Minerva, getting up to deftly slip the enchiladas into the oven, and turn it up a little hotter. 

Diana stills and sniffs the air. “You made _chocolate something_ ,” she accuses.

“Yes, to celebrate you.” Minerva drops a kiss on her mouth, and sits back down. “You’re amazing.”

“I am amazing,” Diana preens. “You didn’t have to make a cake for me, but that’s nice.”

“I like to be nice.” Minerva grins. “Hold on a sec.” She sends her direct supervisor a note saying she’s logging off for the day a little early but she’ll be on early tomorrow, and then logs out of work and shuts her computer. “Okay, Rosalita.”

“You know Luc Chantal spent time in the Bay Area -- a lot of time. And Beatriz Teixeira did too, and so did all her friends,” says Diana. “That’s why I came here, and researched here. And Marina Melnyk _married_ one of Teixeira’s friends, but Luc Chantal’s first kid was with Melnyk, that’s definite.”

“I thought that was never proven, just a rumor. You kept saying . . . last year? That it was just a rumor.”

“Because Luc Chantal kept changing his own Wikipedia site to say that! He never gave an interview about it, just changed his own Wikipedia,” explained Diana. Her eyes kept darting to the kitchen, where the chocolate cake was cooling. Minerva wanted to laugh, but didn’t. “But you can’t change your own Wikipedia site, it’s against the rules. You have to cite a source; you can’t be your own source.”

“That’s dumb,” says Minerva dismissively. “Did you want cake now, or after enchiladas?”

“Enchiladas?” says Diana longingly. “Oh . . .”

“Enchiladas in like an hour,” says Minerva. “Cake can be now.”

“No, I can wait,” says Diana, completely unconvincingly.

“Okay.” Minerva creeps her hand along the table and Diana grins at her and meets her hand and twines their fingers together.

“Seventeen paintings and I am going to prove that guy is Luc Chantal,” says Diana.

“You are going to prove it,” agrees Minerva. “If only it was like a hundred and fifty years ago, you could just ask.”

“Like either of them would tell me,” scoffs Diana. “Marina Melnyk never gave a straight answer to a question in her life, and Luc Chantal was also . . . not straight.”

Minerva bursts out laughing. “Okay, whatever. I did not think queer studies was going to take you to art history, but okay.”

“Yeah, I was only in queer history to meet girls.” Diana winks comically at Minerva, the same way she had in their first queer history class together. They tell each other the history of their relationship a lot, because it’s delightful, and also because it brings them closer together, and also because Minerva loves it, and she guesses Diana does too. Diana had been the fifth or sixth Diana in the class; Minerva had been the third Minerva but the only Mexican one. Everyone’s parents had been so into the resurgence of Rome; Minerva never understood it. They were _Mexican_ , they had their own gods. She almost changed her name a dozen times in her twenties, but now that she was thirty-two, she felt pretty settled into it, and knew Diana felt similarly. 

These days, Minerva knew, it was a resurgence of the Victorian era names. So bizarre. 

Minerva kisses the back of Diana’s hand. “Let me feed you chocolate cake while we talk more about your favorite hockey player.” 

“Don’t tease me!”

“Never!” Minerva smiles at Diana. She can recite all the facts about Luc Chantal herself, but Diana loves to talk about her Master’s thesis -- and now official dissertation -- subject, so Minerva will let her talk. It’ll be a nice night.

**Author's Note:**

> Make Minerva’s enchiladas: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQKtLIxJdJs>
> 
> Make Minerva’s chocolate cake: <https://smittenkitchen.com/2010/08/everyday-chocolate-cake/>
> 
> Someone please write a page or two from Diana’s diss, I’m dying for it.
> 
> PS, This is my first completed fic in fifteen months. Huge thanks to Kat for being a big support while I struggle through my 'creative hibernation'.


End file.
